Kurt Vonnegut Radio with Gabe Hudson Gabe Hudson

Welcome to episode #39 of Kurt Vonnegut Radio 👀
Today on the show we’ve got the amazing writer Anne Kadet. Anne Kadet writes the beloved newsletter CAFÉ ANNE. Anne Kadet has forged a new kind of journalism to cover New York City.
Gabe Hudson talks to Anne Kadet about her beloved newsletter, Caffe Anne, and how she uncovers fascinating stories in New York City that reveals our humanity and accurately reflect our reality but are often overlooked. What makes Anne’s newsletter Cafe Anne so remarkable is that she writes about New York City in a completely new way: it is delightful, heart-expanding, full of humanity and wit, and at times laugh out loud funny. And nobody else is doing anything like it.
Why you want to listen to this episode: The way Anne lives in alignment with the dynamic force of narrative in NYC and the way she is attuned to intersecting stories all around her is something you really need to hear in her own words in order to fully understand and appreciate. It is profound and fun and eye-opening.
(Side note: in addition to being a fabulous writer, Anne has one of the best laughs I’ve encountered. And I don’t think these two qualities are unrelated.)
Quick question: Can you guess what fictional character Anne Kadet most strongly identifies with?
Hint:


Some notable Anne Kadet quotes
On the role that her readers play in the stories she writes for her newsletter
A third of my ideas or even more come from readers. They’re like, “Anne, you gotta check this thing out!”
On the feeling she gets when she goes somewhere and feels the tremors of a story for her newsletter coming into being
Like you’re not supposed to be here, but you are supposed to be here.
On why she believes the best way to tell a story is the easiest way
So I feel like just straightforward chronological order. Talking about what happened and what it was like for me is not only the best way to deliver the story, it also happens to be the easiest way. And I love when the best thing and the easiest thing are the same thing.
On her storytelling maxim “don’t push, don’t pull”
I feel the great story is the story that wants to come out all by itself without me pushing or pulling it. If I'm pushing or pulling, that means I have something specific in mind.
On what she is delivering to readers of her newsletter, CAFÉ ANNE
I simply have a nice ability to deliver an unusual way of looking at the world, on unusual topics, in a professional way.

Show Notes
Subscribe to Anne Kadet’s newsletter CAFÉ ANNE
Other Kurt Vonnegut Radio episodes for your enjoyment:
Dave Eggers
Jen Taub
Maggie Smith
Michael Estrin
Merve Emre
Subscribe to Kurt Vonnegut Radio newsletter/podcast
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today's guest, Mark Wynn, is the subject of a new documentary film called, This is Where I Learned Not to Sleep, made by award-winning filmmakers Anne de Mare and Kristen Kelly. So who is Mark Wynn? Well he's a former police officer in Nashville who – after listening carefully to the women of Nashville in a way that nobody else was – he started the largest domestic violence prevention unit in the country. Mark also a survivor of domestic violence, as was his mother, as were his siblings. And the essence of the story is that he had a stepfather who committed horrible violence against them all in the state of Texas. And on one occasion, this stepfather attacked Mark's mother. She grabbed a baseball bat, hit that man over the head and Mark's family fled back to Nashville. And in the course of this film, Mark returns to that very house in Texas and revisits that trauma bravely and courageously. The other narrative strand that extends through the film is that Mark has spent the last 30 plus years of his life devoted to trying to make the world a safer place for children and women. He has traveled to every state in America and other countries around the world. Speaking to various law enforcement agencies about the need to address interpersonal violence.
I think you'll be mesmerized within minutes of hearing Mark Wynn tell his story and hear the humility, the compassion, the wisdom in his voice. I have never met anyone exactly like Mark Wynn.
October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month


view the doc This is Where I learned Not To Sleep



visit the website for doc This is Where I Learned Not To Sleep



Learn more abt The Mary Parrish Center (founded in honor of Mark’s mother)


Learn more about the filmmakers

National Domestic Violence Hotline: 800-799-7233


Learn more about Mark Wynn



For media related to film, contact Page One Media



Other episodes of Kurt Vonnegut Radio for your enjoyment:

Dave Eggers

Jen Taub

Maggie Smith

Michael Estrin

Merve Emre

Rate/Review Kurt Vonnegut Radio
Subscribe to the Kurt Vonnegut Newsletter
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jen Taub is an acclaimed author, legal scholar, and podcaster extraordinaire. Gabe talks to Jen about why she is putting her whole heart into her podcast Booked Up. This conversation contains many treasures, including the story of how Jen discovered who she was and what was most important to her.
Jen Taub, choice quotes from convo

On why she started her podcast
"Ever since COVID and beyond, we've just been impoverished. And I wanted to rebuild that. I think I started this podcast. I wanted to do this for a while. Because I realized when my second book came out, there weren't that many opportunities to talk to people about it. And I thought I want to be that opportunity for people."
On how being a podcast host requires certain level of improv
"You just may have maybe listened to the Michael Lewis interview, but I didn't realize I was going to say to him, ‘Oh, so you write.’ And like, he went with it."
On the art of asking a question ( by not asking a question)
"I don't typically ask a direct question. I'll say something about myself. I'll make a random comment. And the next thing, you know, someone's told me their life story. People really want to be seen and they want to be heard. And I really want to hear and see them."
On her idea of heaven
"Talking with the authors is heaven."

Subscribe & listen to “Booked Up with Jen Taub” on Apple or Spotify

Subscribe to Jennifer Taub’s newsletter Money & Gossip

Visit Jennifer’s website and follow her on twitter & instagram

Buy Jennifer’s critically acclaimed book Big Dirty Money

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is the 2nd and final part of Gabe's conversation with Dave Eggers
Dave opens up and gets candid about his own artistic impulse to pivot with each writing project. He talks about his early days in art school, and what drew him to certain artists. He talks about Lorrie Moore, George Saunders, , and why he thinks Percival Everett is probably the rightful heir to the more radical writers of the 60’s.
For Gabe, this conversation was somewhat emotional (but in a good one). As Dave notes at the end of our convo, they've been friends now for 25 years. Also, at some point in here, the writer Michael Lewis comes up: and Gabe talks about how he heard Michael Lewis on the podcast Smartless, talking about in the aftermath of losing his daughter: his friend Dave Eggers showed up on his porch with food, and told Michael, “I’m going to be right there in that car in front of your house, for the next 24 hours.” And then Michael Lewis talked about he had never experienced grief and loss like that, and what he learned from Dave in that gesture is that that is the best and most compassionate thing you can do for someone.
Anyway, if this episode has a theme it is definitely capital F friendship.

Dave Eggers quotes

On Lorrie Moore and her new book
I've been reading Laurie Moore's new book. I'm only in the second chapter, but she's always been one of my favorite writers for the same reason. She's so funny. She writes beautiful sentences, but she was not afraid to throw in One liners every paragraph. And they're really one liners. They're really tightly written. They're very funny and they're not afraid to go for the laugh. She’s a national treasure, one of our best writers, every bit as funny and important as Mark Twain was in his time.

On Kurt Vonnegut
I think that people should know that he was the guy that you'd want him to be. He was every bit as generous, and kind. And, we asked him to do the intro to the Best American Non Required Reading, which I used to edit. And he wrote a fax back. He used to fax and he wrote back, Dear Believer. Cause he got it mixed up , he's like, I wish I could do the intro. That would have been a gas or something like that. It sounded like he didn't either didn't sound like he 100 percent meant it, joking like boy, , what fun that would have been. But I'm, old and tired and I can't do it. Something like that. It was very him. And, we've kept and framed this fax by him and, but you know, he was exactly the guy that he was on the page and that's not that common.

Buy Dave Eggers’ new novel The Eyes and the Impossible (with wooden cover) from McSweeney’s
Buy Dave’s new novel (without wooden cover) from Bookshop
Visit the McSweeney’s website
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Gabe and Dave Eggers have been friends for the last 25 years: since Dave first popped up on the national stage, with his memoir, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius. And his indie publishing juggernaut: McSweeney's. 
This interview is, in part, to support Dave's new novel, The Eyes and the Impossible. A novel that’s for all ages. And for the ages. This book is written in the first person, from the perspective of a dog named Johannes. (Go ahead, take a second to reread that last sentence.) This book is wondrous, beautiful, hilarious, and somewhat heartbreaking. It also has gorgeous illustrations. And some editions have a wooden cover.

Dave Eggers quotes

On having lunch with Kurt Vonnegut
Gabe: Vonnegut was obsessed with the idea, and I know you know this because I have always known that you love him, too –Dave: I met him.Gabe: You met him? Well can you tell me about that?Dave: in New York. His wife, Jill Krementz, reached out and she was a photographer. So she did a photo thing of me in Central Park. And she said, Oh, you know, you’ve got to come over. And it was a lunch, I think, in their house in the twenties. And it was me. This was 2002. And it was me and Colson Whitehead and, I think John Leonard. And then there was a jazz writer. And then Vonnegut and Jill. And what was funny was… (click the above podcast device to hear the rest)On early McSweeney’s event with David Byrne
We did one “happening” in San Francisco at a place called Cell Space. Which is this cavernous sort of event hall slash living environment. It was like a pirate ship, with people living in the rafters and under the stage. It was really old timey San Francisco hippie space, but most of the people there were youngish. And we had an event there where David Byrne might have been out here for his book, The New Sins, that we published.We said it would be a panel. And it was Byrne and I on the panel. And then we got an FBI agent, who I don't know why or who he was. I can't remember how we found him. And then a local professor who was an expert on ancient Sumerian iconography, I think.And we planted a bunch of people in the audience, so that the Q&A – because I think we went straight to Q&A – was all directed to the Sumerian iconography experts. So that you have David Byrne sitting there, silent, for an hour. Because every last question was somebody like, “Well, in AD 540, the Sumerian, poet…” We had all of these questions written by the expert himself beforehand.And then the whole thing ended, we had booked, I think with David Byrne's knowledge, but maybe without. We had booked a band called the Extra Action Marching Band, which was a big sort of anarchic marching band with tattoos and piercings and weird clothes. But drums and a majorette and everything. And they broke into the place and then just shut the whole event down by playing in the crowd until it was over. So the event was crazy.
Buy Dave Eggers’ new novel The Eyes and the Impossible (with wooden cover) from McSweeney’s
Buy Dave’s new novel (without wooden cover) from Bookshop
Rate/review Kurt Vonnegut Radio on podcast platform of your choice
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Gabe interviews special guest author, Michael Estrin , who writes the beloved newsletter, Situation Normal . Around which a big community of fervent super-devoted readers has sprung up. Michael’s comic stories from his life are big-hearted and sometimes weird. When you talk to him about the community of readers that gather around his words, his deep affection for them shines through. The other cool thing about Michael's writing endeavor is his creative partnership with his wife.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices